Got A Minute?
by Princess Cheesecake
Summary: Garrus, Shepard, and some awkward conversations.
1. Chapter 1

"Hey, you got a minute?"

"Calibrating…" was all he said, too absorbed in the process to even turn to look. She frowned, but settled down on the crates in the corner, her usual spot. The main battery was a lonely, secluded, and rather chilly part of the ship, but it was here that she felt most comfortable.

The mess hall was nice, but could get far too crowded for her tastes. The bridge always made her feel like she should be doing some sort of work, and sometimes her own quarters were just too lonely for her to stand. Here? Well, it was clear to her why she spent so much time down here, and it certainly wasn't the pile of crates she was curled up on.

"Don't you have some work to do, Commander?" he asked her, eyes still glued on the display screen, catching her off guard. Normally he wasn't one for conversation while he was working. She was used to the silence.

"Are you trying to get rid of me?" she asked, smiling slightly.

"What? N-no, of course not," he said quickly, finally turning to her as he fumbled over his words. "You know you can come here whenever you want, I mean, it's your ship…" If Turians could blush, she was sure he would. The thought of it almost made her blush.

"If I'm distracting you I can leave," she said, furiously trying to repress the pink that was trying to spread to her cheeks. "I probably have some paperwork or something I should be doing."

"No, no, it's fine," he told her, quickly turning back to the display and allowing them both to avoid seeing the embarrassment on each other's face. "I don't mind…" he added quietly as they both settled back into their work. She quickly busied herself with her omni-tool, trying to keep her mind off the thoughts that were beginning to creep up on her.

Slowly the silence stopped being awkward and everything seemed to return to normal. She began playing a game on her omni-tool, something silly and distracting as she listened to the slight taps and pings of the console as he worked. They could hear sounds from the rest of the ship, too; distant voices and footsteps, but they were too far removed to matter. Here, they were alone.

"It's so quiet…" she said suddenly, and immediately regretted it. Breaking the silence felt like breaking some sort of taboo. She bit her lip as she waited for a reaction. He seemed almost as surprised as she was that the silence had ended.

"Well… Is there something you want to talk about?" he asked slowly, crossing his arms as he turned to look at her.

"No, not really," she said, feeling quite awkward. She hated being put on the spot. "Really, I don't want to talk about anything," she insisted as he continued to stare at her. Finally, he sighed and turned back to the display

"Alright…It's just-"

"Just what?" she demanded, frowning.

"You never talk about yourself," he said flatly.

"What?" She hadn't been expecting that. "Where did that come from? Am I supposed to?" she asked, frowning so much it made her face hurt.

"I don't know, I guess you don't have too," he said, rubbing his neck. The tone in his voice was strained. Annoyed? Maybe just embarrassed, she couldn't tell. "It's just you spend so much time digging into everyone else's problems. You know…um, you know if you want to talk, I'm here."

This time there was no way for her to stop the blush that spread to her face, at the same time as a familiar stab of guilt cut into her chest. Immediately she felt her walls begin to go up. "Really, there's nothing wrong," she heard herself saying, forcing a small smile.

"Shepard." He hit something on the console and the doors closed. She immediately felt trapped. Fuck, she did not want to have this conversation.

"Garrus, I don't need a therapy session," she frowned, standing up, hands on her hips. It was times like this she wished she was a few inches taller. It was hard to look intimidating when she had to crane her neck just to look him in the face "Let me out, I have work to do."

"Paperwork? Shepard, you were dead for two years. Kaiden, Akuze, spirits know what else happened to you. There's no way you're as well adjusted as you pretend to be," he said, carefully positioning himself between her and the console that unlocked the door.

"You're one to talk," she cut in sourly.

"That's… Don't change the subject," he said, appearing slightly flustered. "You might be fooling everyone else, but trust me, no one spends their free time back here unless they're avoiding something."

"But you spend all your time back he-… Oh." The look on his face was unreadable, but she knew she had touched a nerve. "Look, I just…" She let out an aggravated sigh; she didn't even know what she was trying to say. "Let's not talk about this, okay?"

"Something's wrong, Shepard. You might be able to fool everyone else, but I can tell. You don't want to talk about it? Fine. But don't try and tell me everything's peachy when I know it's not," he told her, arms crossed like some sort of disapproving parent. It made her feel small, or, well, smaller than she already was. Frustrated, she plopped back down onto the crates, staring at the floor.

"You wouldn't understand," she said bitterly.

"Try me," he said.

"You've heard Miranda! I'm some sort of icon now. It's… It's terrible," she said, her walls breaking down. A frustrated sigh left her lips as she ran a hand through her hair, leaving it messy and disorganized, like her thoughts. "Everyone expects me to do the right thing, say the right thing, give all the orders, save the goddamn galaxy. _Why?_ Because I'm Commander Shepard? Fuck, Garrus, I can't even keep my fish alive, how did I end up doing this?"

"I don't know," he said, taking a seat next to her. "How did you?" His voice was very level; he seemed more curious than anything. She eyed the console, wondering if she could manage to beat him to it and open the door before he could stop her. Instead she just bit her lip.

"Fuck if I know," she sighed. "I'm just some little orphan girl that decided to run away and join the military. Ten years ago, if you told me I'd be some sort of savior of the galaxy, I would have said you were off your fucking rocker. I never tried to be a hero, I never _wanted _to be one. Things just… happened. Akuze, Eden Prime. I just did my best with what I was presented with, and now I'm running around the galaxy with all these crazy badasses trying to stop some super-powered alien race from destroying all sentient life."

"You make it sound like all of this happened because if random chance," Garrus said skeptically.

"That's what it feels like," she said, pulling her knees up to her chest defensively. "What if… What if I had stayed back on earth? In the slums, the gangs. Or what if I'd died at Akuze? Or… Or just stayed dead and Cerberus never brought me back?" She dropped her head, hiding her face against her knees so he couldn't see the look on her face. "Everyone looks at me and sees a hero, or this… stupid icon of hope or something. But whenever I look in the mirror I just see the same scared little girl I was in basic training eleven years ago." She stopped for a beat. "Fuck, thirteen years ago. My timeline is all screwed up…"

They sat there, trapped in silence for what felt like the longest time. Shepard couldn't tell what Garrus was thinking, she didn't even dare glance up to look him in the face. A big part of her just wanted to run back to her quarters and hide for what she had just told him. She hadn't said anything like that to anyone in years. Not since… Well, she wasn't going to get into that now. No need to bring up even more bad memories.

"If it helps at all," he said carefully, breaking the silence. "When I look at you, I see… Shepard. Not the hero. Not the icon. I mean, I certainly wouldn't want to get on your bad side, but mostly… You're my friend."

"R-really?" She lifted her head to stare at him, her eyes wide and skeptical.

"Well I wouldn't let you hang around here so much if you weren't," he said wryly, making her smile.

"Garrus, that means a lot to me," she said, the pink tinge returning to her cheeks. She didn't even try to stop it this time. "Like it's stupid how much that means to me. Fuck, you must think I'm the biggest dork ever right now," she laughed awkwardly.

"You've always been a bit of a dork, Shepard," he said. "It's okay, though, I don't think people could handle it if you were as classy as me."

"Hey, I might be a dork but I can still order you around," she said, but she was smiling. Everything was back to normal again. No. It was better than normal. She'd always gotten along with Garrus, always liked him, even crushed on him a little. But two years behind the whole galaxy and surrounded by people she hardly knew or trusted, it meant everything to have him here. Some ounce of her old life, someone she could trust to watch her back on a mission.

"Thanks, Garrus," she said as he headed back over to the console. He pressed something and the doors slid open.

"I'm here when you need me, Shepard," he told her.


	2. Chapter 2

_Author'sNote: So I've decided this story is actually just going to be a collection of little Shepard/Garrus one-shots that follow their relationship as it develops. Some chapters will be short (like this one), and some longer. I still haven't decided whether to keep them exclusively conversations on the Normandy (one of my original concepts) or branch out and set it wherever I feel like writing a scene. We'll see…_

"Shepard, you know that food is for turians…" Miranda raised a skeptical eyebrow as Shepard gingerly took a cheap plastic bowl out of the microwave, some sort of instant soup, though she wasn't sure what kind exactly. All the directions on it were written in turian.

"I know, it's not for me," Shepard said. "Ah, hot," she hissed, quickly putting the bowl back on the counter to cool. "It's for Garrus," she explained, turning to Miranda.

"You make his food for him?" she asked, surprised. She was still getting use to the Normandy's newest crew member, and still wasn't sure how she felt about his past with Shepard. On one hand, having him around had greatly improved the Commander's mood and he was as capable a fighter as his dossier had said. But he was still an alien, and she couldn't help but feel a little uncomfortable about how much Shepard deferred to him.

"No," the Commander said defensively. "Well, not always. But he gets pretty wrapped up in his work sometimes, forgets to eat. He's a pretty terrible cook, actually," she laughed, catching Miranda off guard. That was not a sight she was used to, though to be fair Shepard had been in an understandably foul mood since her rude awakening. Maybe she was finally starting to cheer up.

"All he ever eats are these little instant meals actually," Shepard said, making a face. "I really don't think that's very good for him, but he's the type of guy who'd burn water. Do you think Gardner knows how to make turian food? Hmm, or maybe I could try out a recipe or two myself…"

"You two are really close, aren't you?" Miranda said, carefully scrutinizing the commander. The reports on her had always said her squad was important to her, but this seemed a little much. She couldn't help but get the feeling that Shepard and the turian were a bit more than just colleagues.

"Well, we've worked together a lot," Shepard said, slightly flustered. "And… yes, I suppose we're… good friends." Was she blushing? Miranda couldn't tell.

"Your soup is getting cold," she said with a small smile, changing the topic before the commander could get even more uncomfortable. This was…amusing information, at the very least. She wasn't positive, but it seemed like Shepard had a crush on Archangel.

"I'll talk to you later, Miranda," she said, picking up the bowl and backing out of the kitchen, towards the main battery. There was still the slightest tinge of pink on her cheeks. Yes, she was definitely blushing.

"Very, very interesting," Miranda said to herself as she watched the doors of the main battery open for Shepard. The turian turned away from the console when she entered and then the doors closed again. Damn. She'd have to go over the security footage later to find out what happened.

"Never thought you had a weakness for men with scars, Shepard," she laughed to herself as she headed back to her office.


	3. Chapter 3

_Author's Notes: Ahh, here is some more very silly Shepard and Garrus. The ending is pretty weak, but I have a lot of animating I have to do for the next few days and I kind of ran myself into the ground with this little snippet. I plan on doing something more serious and fluffy for the next chapter. We'll see~_

Technically, there really wasn't any sort of night and day on the Normandy. They were in space, for fucks sake, jumping from one planet to another faster than Mordin could count to ten. Even so, there was still some sort of order to things. Gardner served three meals within a twenty-four hour period and labeled them breakfast, lunch, and dinner, though sometimes it was hard to distinguish one from the other. Most of his food resembled a brownish sloppy mass in the end.

Right now it was that awkward point in time between what had apparently been dinner and what would be breakfast. The ship was quiet, most of the crew asleep save for those tasked with running whatever systems that couldn't be automated, or anyone restless enough to still be up and working.

Well, Garrus was up at least. Not exactly working. He'd spent the last hour doing extranet searches on himself and a few of the other crew members. It had started as a legitimate attempt to try and gain some information on some of these Cerberus members, who he considered about as trustworthy as a backstreet conman. But in the end he just ended up dicking around, and after finding one particularly raunchy site with Miranda's name in it, he decided to call it quits. At least for now.

He needed a snack.

He did a quick sweep of the ship outside the main battery, just to see if anyone was around. It was stupid, but he didn't like going out when there were other crew members around. No one ever gave him any problems, but Cerberus's reputation as an anti-alien terrorist group still kept him on edge. Shepard seemed to trust them, and he trusted Shepard. But he wasn't about to go anywhere on the ship without knowing he had a wall to his back and a gun at hand.

But the place seemed empty now, so he headed out without too much worry. He'd get his instant, packaged, processed-ten-times-over meal and head back to the main battery. No need to talk to anyone or interact with anyone or-

"Hey you."

Shit.

Garrus fought the automatic urge to just turn and head back to the main battery, but that would be… awkward. The blond human, female, was staring at him from where she stood in the little kitchenette, wearing some slouchy grey outfit which he'd heard referred to as "sweats" and… Oh wait.

"Hey Shepard," he said, his apprehension disappearing as he finally recognized her. He wasn't used to seeing her out of her armor, or that formal military uniform she always wore around the ship. It didn't really occur to him that she wore anything else.

"You're up late," she told him, smiling, and making her nose wrinkle ever so slightly. He had no idea why he noticed that. Noses were so odd anyway…

"So are you," he said to her, heading to the far left cabinet where he stashed his dextro-protein food, hidden in the back. Reaching up, he began trying to sort through and find something he felt like eating.

"Point taken," she said. Hmm, paro-artificially flavored soup or tarujien-flavord? Neither of them tasted like the real thing, but he still couldn't decide.

"Hey, Garrus. You're tall, right?" Shepard asked suddenly. His attention moved from the instant soups to her face, staring up at him.

"…Yes?" he said slowly, not exactly sure how to answer. Well, he supposed he was. Maybe not so much for a Turian, but for humans definitely. And Shepard was particularly small for a human. Williams and Alenko used to tease her about it, he wasn't sure why. He just thought it was adorab- … No. Never mind.

"Can you reach the coffee on that top shelf?" she asked, pointing at the middle cabinet.

"The… the what?"

"The coffee. It's like… ground up bean stuff. It's filled with caffeine, I need it to stay awake," she told him.

"Why do you need to stay awake? Shepard, it's…" He paused, then realized he had no idea what time it actually was."Very, very late," he decided. "And we are probably going to have to kill a lot of mercenaries tomorrow. You should get some sleep."

"You can't patronize me, you're awake too," she scoffed, putting her hands on her hips. Like when she was arguing with a krogan battlemaster, only decidedly less intimidating. Mostly due to the lack of her armor. "You go to bed," she ordered him.

"I have things I need to do," he argued, firmly crossing his arms to stare her down.

"Calibra-"

"Don't even say it," he growled sourly.

"_Calibrations_," she said smugly.

"Those guns are complicated, they take a long time to calibrate!"

"My name is Garrus Vakarian, I live in the Main Battery and I looove to calibrate. Mmm, yeah, nothin' like those calibrations, they just hit the spot, yes sir," Shepard said in a ridiculously deep voice, strutting around the kitchen in some sort of ditzy, awkward impression of him. Hmph. If that's how she wanted to play it…

"Hi, I'm Commander Shepard, and I like to spend my free time fixing other people's problems," he said, forcing his voice as high as it could go and jutting his hips out awkwardly. "I am soooo pretty, all the boys and Asari loooove me."

"I have shark teeth and I am the coooolest sniper eeeever," Shepard growled. "Look at my cool face paint, I am so cool."

"Look at these funny bumps on my chest, they are soooo attractive," Garrus said, sashaying around Shepard.

"I'm dextro-protein, so I can't eat pancakes even though they're delicious."

"I can save the galaxy but I can't keep my fish alive for more than a wee-"

Garrus froze mid-flounce, suddenly and horribly self-conscious as he realized he and Shepard were no longer the only two in the room. Shepard froze too, as soon as she realized why he had stopped.

"Ah, Miss Lawson," she said calmly, composing herself like nothing had happened. Garrus tried to do the same.

"Commander… Shepard…" Miranda was staring at the two from the edge of the kitchenette, her face the most incredulous thing he had ever seen in his life. "Have I… interrupted something?" she asked.

"Officer Vakarian and I were just having a late night discussion, nothing important," Shepard said, her face completely serious. "Did you need something?"

"N-no," Miranda said quickly. "Just… I should be going. Commander," she said. "Vakarian," she added with a little nod, then quickly made a break for it. Garrus and Shepard stood there silently for several seconds, not moving, until they heard the door to Miranda's quarters open and shut.

"Late night discussion?" Garrus asked quietly. Shepard let out a small snort, then a snicker, and then they both burst out laughing.


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's Note: Blah, okay, this chapter is done and I am not touching it again. Not ever. Hopefully future chapters will be better (and maybe I'll finally figure out a direction for this damn thing aside from fluffy little snippets). Also, I would like to note that I love Kaidan, but I've always figured that he and Garrus would have a bad relationship, particularly when it comes to Shepard. So thus the Kaidan hate here._

"Fuck that guy, Shepard. We don't anymore tight asses like him hangin' around the Normandy anyway," Jack snorted loudly as they parted ways with Lieutenant Alenko, loud enough for him to hear. If he did, though, he didn't act like it, and just kept walking, the sound of his boots on the dirt growing thankfully fainter. Garrus quickly shot the convict a look before she could say anything else to the commander. He knew she was just trying to help, and frankly he was surprised she was even doing that. But he also knew the last thing Shepard wanted to do right now was talk.

The shuttle ride back from Horizon was awkward to say the least. Garrus felt like he should say something, and a good part of him just wanted to agree with what Jack had said. But from the look on Shepard's face, one wrong word would either make her start shooting or cause her to burst into tears, and he had no idea how he was going to deal with either of those situations aside from maybe a concussive shot to the head. And that would just upset her all over again.

Thank the spirits the ride ended when it did.

Shepard was immediately called to a debriefing with the Illusive Man, leaving Jack and Garrus to try and shrug off the awkward sense of doom that had been hovering over them the entire flight back.

"What the hell has her panties all torn up?" Jack demanded as they clambered out of the shuttle. Shepard was safely out of hearing range. "Who the fuck was that guy anyway?"

"Kaidan Alenko," Garrus said, suppressing a growl. The two of them had never really gotten along, despite how often Shepard had dragged them on missions together.

"Who?"

"Shepard's mate," he told her flatly. He'd found it was easier just to get straight to the point with Jack. She wasn't much of a woman for subtleties.

"You mean boyfriend?" Jack smirked.

"Right."

"Ooo, _spicy_." The laugh she let off was slightly too maniacal for his tastes. "Man, now I kind of wish he had tagged along. Could have been some interesting drama going down…"

"Don't you have some dark corner you should be creeping around in?" Garrus snapped, growing steadily more irritated by the second.

"Shit, spiky, I'm just trying to lighten the mood around here," Jack snarled, stomping off, away towards her hidey-hole. "Fuckin' dark corners are more cheerful than all you crazy bastards…"

Garrus went his own way, heading back to the Main Battery to clean his armor and brood a little. He wasn't exactly sure why he was brooding, that whole mess on Horizon was Shepard's business but… Screw it, Shepard was his friend and after watching Kaidan upset her like that he had every right to be angry.

He'd never liked Kaidan anyway, walking around with that holier-than-thou attitude and that stupid… bump in his hair. And the way he made Shepard act, giggling and blushing and making her so nervous and self-conscious, it was ridiculous! She was the Savior of the Citadel, the first human Spectre, Commander-fucking-Shepard. Why did she always have to ask if her hair looked okay before the two of them headed out on a mission with Alenko? Garrus couldn't have cared less what her hair looked like, or whether her make-up was on right, or whether her face was covered with dirt and sweat and she had a black eye and a bloody nose from wrestling with a Krogan.

He was just happy to have her around. And alive…

But Kaidan… Fuck Kaidan. Shepard deserved better than him, that cowardly, bare-faced _bastard._ He wasn't the only one that had suffered loss, spent two years trying to fill that empty something in the middle of his chest. Even now, Garrus still wasn't sure if Shepard really had been dead or had been faking it for some reason or another and the whole Lazarus Project with Cerberus was some big cover up. But whatever had happened, she needed his help now, probably more than ever.

It wasn't as if she trusted Cerberus anyway, he knew that. Neither of them did. Kaidan should have known that. They'd led her entire unit to slaughter in Akuze, and they were just as likely to betray her now, as soon as she outgrew her usefulness. If that happened she'd need as many friends on this ship as she could get. And right now the only people Garrus could think of that wouldn't stab the Commander in the back if given the right orders were Joker and Dr. Chakwas. Maybe Zaeed, he seemed to get along well with Shepard, but then again Cerberus was the one footing his paycheck.

The point was Kaidan knew Shepard was surrounded by enemies, and had abandoned her anyway. She was his mate, for the sake of the fucking spirits. You don't leave your mate alone like that.

Well, she wasn't alone. Even if Kaidan was off with his armor in a twist, Shepard still had one friend left. And as a friend, he probably shouldn't have just left her to wallow in anger like she usually did during her bad moods.

It was about time he left the main battery anyway.

"EDI, where is-"

"Commander Shepard is in the main hold where the recreational equipment is held," EDI informed him, like she had been waiting for him to ask. Garrus almost felt like pursuing that subject but, well, he had other things to do now.

The Normandy SR2's gym was really nothing more than a bunch of exercise equipment tucked into an empty corner of the hold. It was all designed to fit humans, so Garrus never really bothered with it, but every once in a while he'd come down to chat with Shepard while she lifted weights or worked up a sweat with the punching bag.

She certainly didn't look like she wanted to chat now.

Out of her armor and into a set of loose casual clothes, Shepard had lost a good amount of her bulk. Garrus couldn't help the words that came to mind when he saw her; small, soft, delicate, even fragile. Humans didn't have a shred of natural armor, no overwhelming biotic talent to ward off enemies, not even a mastery of technology and tactics like the Salarians.

But the way she was going after that punching bag right now, he doubted even a Krogan Battlemaster would try to interrupt her. Well, Garrus was no Battlemaster.

"Think it's had enough yet?" Shit. He seriously doubted whether he could have come up with a more pathetic opening line. Worse than a fresh recruit trying to impress one of the older female scouts. And she hadn't even stopped.

"Not in the mood to talk now, Vakarian," Shepard huffed, out of breath. How long had she been at this? They'd been back maybe an hour. At this rate and intensity, he doubted she'd last much longer. She already looked like she was getting a little dizzy.

"Okay, really, you need to take a break," he warned her as she practically savaged the bag. There was hardly a pause between her punches; a right hook flowed into a backfist that was instantly replaced by a straight kick that sent the bag swinging. She ducked as it came back towards her and resumed her strikes without missing a beat.

"What do you want?" she asked harshly, in between breaths.

"Just wanted to talk," he said carefully, the same tone he used to use when talking down hysteric

"I told you I'm not in the mood," she said, her words punctuated by the thud of fist against fabric.

"Because of Kaidan?"

That stopped her. Though unfortunately it didn't stop the punching bag, which finally came swinging back to hit her full force in the face as if in some act of holy inanimate vengeance. The next thing either of them knew, she was flat on her back on the floor a good five feet from where she had been standing.

"Shepard!" He'd seen her take a punch in the face from a Krogan and keep moving like it was nothing, but that didn't stop him from rushing to her side to help. The actual gesture didn't turn out quite as gallant as he had hoped.

"Augh, fuck, my nose!"

"Wait, let me-"

"Don't touch OW-"

"Let me see, Shepard, stop-"

"Garrus, get your claws off me, I'm fine. Hey!" She glared, but stopped trying to push him away as he ran a talon along her nose, searching for damage. "It's not broken," she said, slapping his hand away as she finished sitting up. He took his seat next to her on the cold metal of the floor.

"Just making sure," he said, giving her some space as he became all too aware just how close they were to each other. It was one thing when they were in heavy armor and under enemy fire, this was… he tried not to get distracted by the thought.

"You should go," Shepard told him, her shoulders slumping to echo the frown on her face.

"So you can keep punching that thing until you black out from exhaustion? I don't think so. Shepard, we've been over this before. I'm here if you need to talk. And… You really need to talk," he said, punching her gently on the arm. Her frown lost a little bit of it's severity.

"And why is that, exactly, Officer Vakarian?" she asked, dragging her knees up to her chest.

"Because your mate- sorry, your _boyfriend_, just dumped you. And accused you of being a traitor. And said a variety of other generally upsetting things," Garrus told her, being careful not to tell her what he really thought of Kaidan right now, though from the way she had been attacking that punching bag he wasn't so sure she didn't share the sentiments herself.

"You really know how to sweet talk a girl, Garrus," Shepard groaned, hiding her head between her knees. "It's fine, I'll get over it…"

"By punching things?"

"That's my normal approach, yes," she said, lifting her head up enough for one eye to peer out at him. "Why, you want me to cry it all out?"

"No, I just want you to be happy."

There was quiet then. Not an awkward sort of quiet, like it usually was. More contemplative, though he couldn't see enough of her expression to even give a guess as to what she was thinking.

"Garrus?" she said finally, cutting into his thoughts. It had been long enough that he had begun to think they'd just spend the entire night sitting in silence on the floor. "Do you… Do you want to go up to my room and watch a bunch of really bad horror vids with me so I don't end up sulking alone tonight and sending some angry messages I might regret?" she asked in a rush, finally lifting her head to look at him. She looked suspicious, if anything. Like she expected him to say no. Tell her to act like a soldier, the real Commander Shepard didn't sulk or get upset, just fight the bad guys and punch things and eat three square meals of justice every day. He'd heard her say those exact words before, back on the original Normandy after one very difficult meeting with the council.

"Only if we can spend some time making fun of Alenko and that weird bump on his head," he told her as he stood up.

"You mean his pompadour?" she snorted, finally cracking a smile as she rose to her feet.

"Okay, that word is just as ridiculous as his hair." They headed towards the elevator, their conversation turning from Alenko's hair to his dancing skills, and it occurred to Garrus that they hadn't really had very many conversations that had gone beyond guns and missions and ancient monsters threatening the galaxy. It was nice to have a normal conversation with her. It was nice to be doing something with her that didn't involve their lives being at stake.

It was nice to see her smiling again.


	5. Chapter 5

_Author's Note: Whoops, I totally forgot I even had an account on here. Hahaha, aaawkward. So that's partially why there haven't been any updates, though I appreciated all the comments and subscriptions and stuff, which is why I am going to start attempting to post more. Though this "story" is actually more of just a bunch of random shakarian drabbles without any really plot to them, so either I'll come up with some sort of plot or I'll just keep dumping fluff. Like what I'm posting now. This is something based off a prompt I had that's been sitting around on my hard drive, and hopefully it'll keep you entertained while I try and come up with something better to post._

_In the meantime, if you are really hankering for some Shakarian I update my art blog with fanart and even some ficlets pretty regularly. There's a link on my profile page if you're interested._

"Ugh, spirits, I feel-"

"Terrible?" her voice chimed in from somewhere on his left. He groaned, but not from the pain he felt burning, well, everywhere. He felt like he had just taken in a bottle of Ryncol with a shotgun blast to the chest as the chaser. Managing to crack an eye open, he was greeted with the harsh white interior of the Normandy's med bay, and Shepard's face glaring at his side. "You should have said something," she snapped.

"I didn't think it was that bad," he insisted, trying to ignore the pounding in his head.

"Garrus, you were coughing up blood. I had to have Grunt help me carry you up here because I couldn't even get you to stand. What the fuck were you thinking?" The look on her face told him he probably shouldn't answer. "Christ, I would punch you if I could," she sighed, running a hand through her hair, still disheveled from the mission. Actually, she was still dressed in her armor from the mission, and her bloody nose from that fight with a Geth was still there too, albeit dried.

"How long was I out?" he asked suspiciously, now giving her the same look she had addressed him with just moments before. Keeping his eyes open was starting to make his head pound, but he kept his gaze fixed on her. She fidgeted in her seat.

"Seven hours. Garrus, you were barely breathing, do not give me that look you son of a bitch. You are not allowed to do shit like that and lie around half-dead in the med bay for hours and expect me to go off and file papers or some shit," she told him. "Besides, I was told to give you another dose of antidote when you woke up," she finished, standing up. Garrus closed his eyes to try and will away the throb in his skull.

"Told? Or you demanded to?" he asked her, listening to her footsteps as she crossed to the other side of the room. "Isn't this Chakwas's job?" he said as she came back to his side.

"Chakwas's shift ended an hour ago. _ And_ Mordin is busy trying to figure out exactly what sort of toxin made you react so violently," she cut in before he could ask. "Sorry, Officer, I'm all you get right now. Hope you like needles, because you're going to need a dose of this stuff every four hours until your symptoms go away." Garrus cracked an eye open just long enough to get a look at the syringe she was holding in her hand, filled with something that was a bit too vibrantly green for his liking.

"Just one happy surprise after another today," he groaned.

"You know it, spiky," Shepard said, snapping on what sounded like a pair of latex gloves. "Brace yourself," she told him, wiping down one of the few unarmored areas on his upper arm.

"Can't be that ba-OW. _Shit_." He let out a low growl as he waited for her to finish injecting the medicine. It felt like his arm had been set on fire, and the burn only spread as the antidote traveled through his system.

"Once every four hours, huh?" he said weakly as she removed the needle.

"Could be worse," she told him, pressing a bandage to his arm.

"How?"

"I could be giving these to you in the ass."

"Ha ha ha Shepard," he said sarcastically, trying to ignore the burning that had now spread all through his chest and seemed to go all the way to the tips of his fringe. "Is this supposed to hurt like crazy or am I just dying again?"

"Mordin said that the burn means its working," Shepard said, settling back into her seat next to him. "I've got sedatives I can give you, if you want," she told him, though she seemed wary about the suggestion.

"You're not afraid I won't wake up again?" he joked. Her icy silence told him that was the wrong thing to say. "Shepard?" he prodded, forcing his eyes open to look at the Commander. He wasn't an expert at reading human emotions, but as best he could surmise she was trying very hard not to look upset and failing miserably. "Shit. Shepard, I'm fine."

"Garrus, you can't even sit up. Don't give me that bullshit," she said bitterly, standing up and moving across the room, presumably to fetch the sedative. "This dosage will knock you out for about six hours. Should keep you under for the next application of the antidote." Fuck, she sounded like Mordin now.

"Shepard," he pressed. She ignored him. "Shepard, I'm sorry."

"Good," she snapped, coming back over. "Don't ever do it again."

"Lie about being sick or almost die?"

"Both," she said. She wouldn't even look at him now, eyes firmly locked on the vial of sedative in her hand as she prepped it for application. There were a number of things he wanted to say just then, maybe remind her that they were on a suicide mission, or that she had no right to be angry with him when he'd spent the past two years believing she was dead. But he didn't think he'd be able to stand the look on her face if he did.

"You got it, Commander," was all he said as she gave him the shot of sedative. It was decidedly less painful than the antidote. "Go get some rest," he told her as he started to doze off. "I'm not going anywhere." He found her hand resting on the bed and gave it a short squeeze. Nothing either of them would ever mention again, but it was enough.

"I know," she said softly.


End file.
